The premise for Quindi Records is simple – to represent music with a universality at its core. Without adhering to specific genre tropes, the releases are intended to have a meaning and purpose in all kinds of situations – a social soundtrack as much as a stimulating experience, feeding emotions and the psyche with a sentimental palette of sounds. Lovers’ music, loners’ music, music for friends and family alike.

Woo makes for a perfect choice to meet this loose concept head-on – the music of Clive and Mark Ives straddles disparate worlds and finds its own peculiar balance. On one hand it’s delicate synthesizer music with a minimalist bent, while on the other their joyous, twinkling harmonies have an immediacy that speaks to the soul. You can detect privacy in their craft – the brothers originally recorded their music in relative isolation in London in the 70s, 80s and early 90s. It’s only in recent years their sublime work has enjoyed a wider audience through an extensive run of reissues.

Arcturian Corridor presents a rare, previously unreleased piece of music from Woo – the expansive suite of the title track that unfurls across five parts. It’s an enchanting listen that shows a new breadth and depth to the duo – detailed drum programming and a broader palette of synth tones cascading in elegant unison. The name refers to Arcturus, the fourth brighteststar in the night sky. As Woo themselves explain, “The Arcturian Corridor is said to be a channel of light that brings.

TRACK LISTING

A1: Arc I 4.48
A2: Arc II 4.14
A3: Arc III 3.57
A4: Arc IV 3.40
A5: Arc V 4.16
B1: Love On Other Planets (Woo Remix) 5.13
B2: AC V (Wino Wagon Remix) 7.42
B3: AC II (Ultramarine Remix) 4.18

Corridor are a group from Montreal and their Sub Pop debut, ‘Junior’, was made just yesterday. The rock & roll band had barely inked their record deal when they surfed into studio, racing against time to make the most dazzling, immediate and inventive album of their young career: 39 minutes of darting and dodging guitars, spiralling vocal harmonies and the complicated, goldenrod nostalgia of a Sunday mid-afternoon.

‘Junior’ is the band’s third full-length and their third recorded with their friend, producer (and occasional roommate) Emmanuel Ethier. However 2015’s ‘Le Voyage Éternel’ and 2017’s ‘Supermercado’ were made languorously, their songs taking shape across whole seasons. This time Dominic Berthiaume (vocals/bass), Julian Perreault (guitar), Jonathan Robert (vocals/guitar/synths) and Julien Bakvis (drums) permitted themselves no such indulgence.

Singers, two guitars, bass, drums: the timelessness of the setup underpins the timelessness of the sound, a rock & roll borrowing from each of the past six decades - punk and pop, psych and jangle, daydream and swoon. This is music that’s muscular, exciting and full of love, its riffs a kind of medicine.

Whereas Corridor’s past work could sometimes seem overstuffed, twenty ideas to the same song, the new work is hypnotic, distilled. “Part of the beauty of the thing is that we didn’t have time to think about it,” says Berthiaume. Six of ‘Junior’s 10 tracks were conceived during a single weekend. The words to ‘Bang’ were written on the eve of the sessions, as Robert began to panic: “Je payerai tôt ou tard,” he sings: I’ll pay, sooner or later. Fewer jams, fewer overdubs - no fortnight in the countryside secluding themselves in a chalet. Even the artwork came in the nick of time: in spite of other, meticulous, masterpieces, Robert’s “shitty last-minute collage” (of an egg saying hello) was the one his bandmates went for.

Sub Pop have never before, in their 33-year history, signed a Francophone act. Maybe the band’s magic springs from their ingenious hooks, their topaztinted vision. Maybe it’s the panache of Québec’s insurgent underground scene, or the camaraderie of Robert and Berthiaume, who have played together since they were 14. Maybe it’s their name - a hallway crossed with a toreador. Probably it’s all of these and none of them: ‘Junior’ is a joy, a hasty miracle, because it’s so much damn fun to listen to.

TRACK LISTING

Topographe
Junior
Domino
Goldie
Agent Double
Microscopie
Grand Cheval
Milan
Pow
Bang